Stumbling

I, for one, am always glad and grateful when something I attempt goes smoothly. No bumps in the road, mistakes, wrong turns or stumbles. No doubt I feel as good as I do when none of those things occur is because usually they do occur. When going to the grocery store, for instance, I usually end up getting caught at a traffic light or stuck behind a school bus. Seeing a friendly face, though pleasant, would be better if I was better at remembering names. And conversations would be more satisfying if I was able to more quickly call upon specific words that I wish use. These and other similar every-day examples may seem trivial but the fact is, for most of us, they constitute our lives. They speak to actions in which we are involved are a regular basis.

Stumbling is a regular part of all these activities. This is particularly true in our efforts to communicate as effectively as possible. These days part of my time is spent teaching a business class on globalization. I go into each class prepared to speak to a number of points. While more often than not, I do cover everything I want, nearly 100 percent of the time I do not do it as smoothly as I would like. In part, this is due to the fact students do not always grasp things as well as I might like. But what is even more true, I do not always articulate things as well as I could or should. (Despite the fact I sure try to.)

All this speaks to a key element of communication that all of us share: our communication efforts rarely ever go as well as we would like. Given this truism, yes, we should continue to do as well as we can to communicate well. But perhaps more importantly, we should focus on doing a better job of appreciating the imperfection of virtually all communication efforts. We need to listen to what is being said to us with a higher level of charity and speak to others with an equally high level of patience in the knowledge that often what we are saying may not come out quite as well as we might wish.